Thursday, May 29, 2003

Reactionary reaction to racism

Twin Cities� papers reported last weekend how Bethel College President George Brushaber is reacting to a fifth incident of racist graffiti detected on his campus since January. Apparently he is trying to find the �one person� accountable for these heinous actions. Individual faculty members have even added their own contributions to the Board of Trustees� $10,000 fund that is designed to reward those able to help find and punish the responsible racist.

What kind of reactionary reaction is that? Can Bethel not learn the lessons taught this year at our St. Cloud outpost up the Mississippi River? Why has no one at Bethel yet verbalized the assumption that the graffiti writer must be a member of the campus �community?� Where are the cries of �nostra culpa,� uttered as the mantra of collective guiltists? Why has not Bethel yet commissioned four separate �cultural audits" of the campus? Where are the invitations to sue the college for institutional racism? Why must we wait to hear of new mandatory �diversity training� for all faculty and staff?